To Smile at Death
by Raye Vann
Summary: Everything Panda ever cared about is, poof, gone, and the only option left is clear. [One-sided Panda/Drake]


**A/N: **_I do not own gone or its characters, that honor goes to the awesome Micheal Grant. This is a little one-shot set during Lies, featuring my favorite crack otp. If you don't like boy/boy, then you have just made one sad Panda. 3__  
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Heels dug into the brittle gravel of the road, while sweaty palms pressed violently against the rear of a large car. Eventually the metallic beast groaned in acceptance and complied; its wheels rotating gently against the dark gravel that formed the road.

Fake stars littered the abode like dying fireflies, dancing before the young boy's eyes for the final time. Their taunting glow was pale as the ill moon that seemingly directed it's eerie light upon Panda.

Every sound seemed amplified against the dead of night, causing the lanky boy to visibly winch once or twice. Not that there was any reason for him to worry about how much noise he was making. It wasn't like anyone would try to stop him. _Would they?_

_Anyone?_

No, of course they wouldn't. What a stupid thought. The other Coates kids were buried in their own bottomless void of hunger, too weak and too broken to care about the actions of some kid. That's all he was here, after all. Just some kid. No one even remembered his real name anymore... and he honestly couldn't blame them. After all, his only use was his handy work at driving cars, and there was no gas left for cars to be useful to anyone anymore. Useless car. Useless boy. Both seemed to fit together perfectly in their own twisted fate. Fate. The word wrapped around his throat, making him swallow thickly.

The skinny boy continued in his struggle to push the motor over the slight rise in the road, his too-thin arms weak in their attempts; coated with a damp sheet of sweat from the effort. What he was about to do- no, what he was doing... surely it wasn't fate. It was just some poor, poor kid, who couldn't stand to live behind the suffocating walls of the FAYZ any longer. So much had happened during the time he'd spent confined in the spiteful dome. So much had been lost... so many people. Everyone he'd ever cared about were gone... _poof_.

_Everyone._

_**"What the fuck, Panda?"**_

_**Drake bellowed with laughter, his cold eyes trained on the younger teen with a dark amusement. Panda attempted to look nonchalant, but he could feel the heat creeping up his face. Why had he even bothered trying to talk to Drake? Everyone knew the dead-eyed boy was a nut-case. Still, he felt like a freaking idiot being laughed at like that. **_

_**"And I thought Caine was crazy!" The blonde boy added with a shark-like grin, his expression anything other than friendly.**_

_**"I'm not crazy..." Panda murmured pathetically, though he made no attempt to defend Caine's sanity. He also chose to leave out the fact that out of the two of them, Drake was the one renown for being a psycho. No, saying that would have been dangerous. Being laughed sounded much more pleasant than being whipped. **_

_**Panda gently chewed on his thumb nail -a habit he'd picked up from his mother- and without another word he turned towards the neatly parked SUV; slipping his thin hand under the door handle. Drake didn't attempt to carry on the conversation, but that didn't surprise him much, as the other boy didn't seem like the type to enjoy small talk. However, that didn't mean he'd stopped laughing. No, not at all. He was still barking and yipping in a language only meant to mock. The noise annoyed Panda to the core, not that he dared show it. God forbid anyone showing Drake that they were annoyed.**_

_**"Where's Bug?" Panda asked in a slightly clipped tone, yanking open the car door and climbing nimbly in. The only answer he received, was the continuous laughter of the Whip Hand. Laughing and laughing, grinding down on his nerves fraction by fraction, like a foot jamming on the acceleration.**_

_**Stupid freak. Stupid psycho freak! Panda grumbled mentally. What was so funny about what he had said anyway? It wasn't a joke. He didn't do jokes; not since the dome came down, anyway. It had been an honest question. A stupid question apparently; 'What do you think of Diana? Pretty isn't she?'**_

_**Maybe he deserved to be laughed at... Everyone knew that Drake despised girls. He was kind of... what was the word; misogynistic? Still Panda hadn't been able to help his curiosity. He'd seen the looks Drake had given her; full of loathing and anger and lust. He just wanted to know what was going on in the sadistic freak's mind. That was all. There was nothing wrong with curiosity, right?**_

_**He'd always wanted to know what Drake was thinking behind his grey, dead eyes. Though, he'd probably never know just how twisted and warped the other teens mind really was. Maybe that was why he always tried so hard to understand... when something is unobtainable it only makes you want to try all that harder. That or quit, and Panda had never been much of a quitter.**_

_**There was something about Drake that Panda was drawn to. A certain familiarity in his sadistic manner. In a way Drake was like his father; cold and indifferent with unexplained bursts of anger. It was the only familiar thing under the confining walls of the FAYZ. It made Drake the only person he could bring himself to like.**_

_**Well 'like' being a rather strong word, seeing as Drake seemed impossible to like at all. He was a disgusting, murderous, terrifying brute. Constantly keeping the other children on edge. Everyone feared his unpredictability. But he was permanently there inside Panda's mind; slinking behind his eyelids whenever he blinked. There was not a single moment that the other boy didn't occupy his mind. Now whether this was due to a freakish desire to figure Drake out, or just plain fear was unknown to him. Though, he couldn't help but hope it was the latter. **_

_**Drake hauled himself into the back of the motor, still laughing obnoxiously as he did so; irritating Panda to no end. Seriously. How long was he going to laugh?**_

_**"Do you like that bitch or something?" Drake tittered, lounging back in his seat. **_

_**Why would Panda like her? He barely saw her. And why wouldn't Drake just shut up. Was he doing it on purpose? Pushing Panda to the furthest he could go? Well, he wouldn't respond, he just wouldn't. Might as well give Drake an excuse to snap his neck.**_

_**"I said..." Drake's long tendril was around Panda's neck fasted than the sickly skinny teen could yelp. Contracting and pulsing repulsively around his adam's apple. His whole body was yanked comically backwards, as Drake leaned in closer; his usually sadistic, playful eyes, flashing dangerously. "Do you like that bitch?"**_

_**"I don't, I don't!" Panda's bony hands shot to his throat, long fingers curling around the tentacle in a weak attempt to pry it of. For an instant he was reminded of his mother. How she'd call out apologies whenever his father struck her. 'I'm sorry, I'm sorry!' He'd never understood back then, why she didn't tell him to leave... Why she let him threaten her and hit her. Well now... now he knew. **_

_**Fear was a nice feeling. The fast paced beating of a panicked heart was the only thing that showed Panda that he was still alive. He was addicted to it now, like his mother had been. Addicted to Drake's unpredictability. He'd never felt so frightened, and so magnetized by the though of being threatened. It wasn't right. He wasn't right. "Get of me." **_

_**"Oh, get of me, get of me!" Drake mocked in a higher pitched voice, his eyes narrowed slits of loathing. "I bet you do like her."**_

_**Panda made the mistake of looking down at the poignant arm that held his throat, and seemed to loose all trail of thought; a violent shiver running down his spine. Disgusting. "I..."**_

_**"Bet you watch her get changed at night!"**_

_**"No-"**_

_**"Diana, Diana, why don't you love me?"**_

_**"I didn't!"**_

_**Drake's glare simpered to a sarcastic sneer as he released Panda's neck. "Here comes Bug. We better get a move on, right?" Panda could only manage to give the other boy a tight nod, his pale hand massaging his throat.**_

Panda's frantic feet slipped away beneath him; the ground rushing up to meet him in an eager greeting, as the teen found himself unable to push the car much further. His bony hands made contact with the gravel first, scraping the already raw skin, in an ironic attempt to stop the collision. The brunette kneeled there for a moment, on all fours while he painfully inhaled air. Panting pathetically like a dog; hands sticky with his own blood. It stung a little. Made him feel a bit better.

Letting his exhaustion take way, the young boy collapsed in a heap of bones and skin to the floor. He had the strangest feeling that someone would have laughed until they pissed at the sight of him now. A name flickered past the back of his mind... but the boy was quick to shove the name away. Such a painful, poison name had no place in his head; not anymore. If that was true... then why did it refuse to slither away like the other thoughts he'd managed to bottle up?

_Drake?_

_**"Pull over here, Panda," Drake said.**_

_**"Why?" He seemed quite distracted as he carefully drove the metallic green SUV, making sure not to go any speed above 30 miles per hour. Sure, it irritated some people, but he'd rather annoy someone than end up killing them -and him- because of reckless driving.**_

_**"Because that's what I said to do, that's why," Drake added irritably, clearly not bothered by the 'driver's' slight distraction. Panda eyed Drake wearily as he eased the car to a stop, though he was quick to look away when the shark-like teen met his stare with cold, silver eyes. He could practically feel Drake's eyes boring into the back of his head, and swiftly busied himself with brushing non-existent dust from the car's steering wheel.**_

_**"I really don't like you." He muttered quietly to himself, earning a 'Huh?' from Drake. "Nothing." For a moment he wondered if Drake had something to say... or maybe he was just deciding whether to wrap that eerie snake of an arm around Panda's neck; again... The thought caused him to shudder. Though he was soon snapped out his little daydream when Drake spoke up quite suddenly.**_

_**"Bug, we'll hike from here." Drake stated, swinging the door open with an unnecessary force that caused both Bug, and Panda to jump. Panda stared silently as the psycho flexed his tentacle arm; his expression a mixture of fear and awe as he watched it curl back around Drake's body, like a python waiting to strike. A twisted representation of deadly grace. "Wait here, until me and Bug get back. Don't move." The psycho ordered over his shoulder, as Bug slid from the car in a far-from-elegant manner. And with that, the Whip Hand and the snot-nosed creep were gone. No, Panda thought tartly, I really don't like him at all.**_

Too much pain. His whole body ached from hunger and neglect; though it couldn't compare to the twisted hole that had been carved out of his heart. Drake, the only familiar thing in his small, confined world, was gone. _Poof_. Dead.

Panda ran a hand through his filthy, dark hair, only to stare in a detached manner at the dry mass of strands that fell lightly to the ground; dying. His whole being was dead... from the torturous black hole of a stomach, to the gaunt skin that stretched over his bones in a skeletal manner. Yes, so very dead. Though, as he lay there against the cold ground, he failed to see why he shouldn't embrace death. A cowardly way out. Yes, that is what he used to tell himself when he contemplated this easy option... but now all he could manage to do, was to walk to it willingly; before he lost all sense of mind. No one was going to last much longer anyway. No one._ Not even Drake could stay alive._

_**Panda's dark-rimmed eyes stared blankly ahead, seemingly unblinking as he awaited Caine's arrival back at Coates. Neither Caine, Drake nor Diana had been heard from since their departure to secure he power plant; though, it was presumed it went well, considering that the electricity had been shut down as expected.**_

_**Still, he'd grown anxious and jittery upon the small party's departure. He had begun to feel rather detached from the world, finding things to be quite surreal. It would be an understatement to say that he looked doused in relief the moment two distant silhouettes appeared upon the fake horizon.**_

_**Tentatively stepping forward, the young boy moved to greet the two returning kids; noticing only seconds after, that they were short by two. Fear was the most prominent emotion to flicker across his face; but worry came in a close second. They must have lost people...**_

_**"Caine, wha-" Panda seemed unable to finish his sentence for a moment, his dark-rimmed eyes widening a touch as he finally took in the other's appearances. Caine looked terrible, his skin paler than white, and eyes swollen and red; Diana -to put it in simpler terms- looked as though she had been reaped and then brought back from the dead; hair and shirt crusted with dry blood, even though she bore no injuries. He swallowed thickly and started again, "What happened? Where is- Where are... the others?" Where is Drake?**_

_**Caine's pallid face darkened to an expression of pure loathing. Despite the hate not intentionally being directed at Panda, it was enough to force the young boy several steps backwards.**_

_**"They're gone." The second word was filled with venom, sending a terrified shudder down the younger teen's spine.**_

_**"But...Drake?"**_

_**"Dead."**_

_**"Oh..." was all Panda could manage, his pale eyes glazing over with dreadful comprehension. "Oh."**_

"This is just dumb". Though, even as those words left the lanky boy's dry lips, he could not bring himself to believe them. He took a deep, shaking breath, before using the boot of the car to prop himself up on unstable legs. He had lost all reason to carry on struggling through the trails of the FAYZ. It made much more sense to take his leave. Now that was strange, something making perfect sense in the FAYZ. Surely he must have been going crazy? Sense and the FAYZ didn't belong in the same chapter, let alone sentence. No. Never.

After a moment of getting his bearings, the young boy idly made his way to the driver's side of the car. Opening the car door, and giving it a little test-shove to see if it would hold. Then, with a sigh that sounded suspiciously like a sob, Panda threw what was left of his weight against the car door; his thin legs working double-time to get the large SUV back in motion. It was a trial and error thing, he noticed, as he pushed against the car for the third time. But this time the whole motor groaned and complied, as he forced it to roll over the small hill that had troubled him not long before. Maybe it was the possibility of seeing Drake in death, that was forcing him forward; or possibly just the thought of a final release, but whatever it was, it sure did the trick. The car was over the small rise, and rolling steadily down the slope. Fast. _Too fast._

The brunette teen pumped his aching limbs to their limits, his breathing clipped and haggard as he chased the car with little grace at all. Maybe on any other day it could have been funny... But not today. No. Not today. In one final effort he leaped for the car seat, gripping at the material frantically, before he finally managed to swing himself into the SUV.

Relief. That was the first emotion... then foreboding, as he realized this was it. By jumping into the moving car, he'd pretty much just confirmed his death. The car wasn't going to stop now. No turning back anymore. The wheels were set in motion. _This was it. _"See you in hell, Drake." And as the car crashed down the slope, gaining in speed as it rapidly approached the rusting barrier that separated the road from the cliff-drop, Panda did something he hadn't done since the beginning of the FAYZ. He smiled.


End file.
